This is a trip my wife and I took during month 4 of the COVID-19 pandemic. We’d had Mount Rushmore on our “bucket list” for years. And with the combination of social distancing orders, fears of flying, and our empty nester status, it seemed like the perfect time for a long-distance RV trip.
The trip is 8 days long, if starting from the Dallas – Ft. Worth area, and spans 2,800 miles. We live in Austin but decided to make the 3-hour drive to Ft. Worth the afternoon before Day 1 as shown in our itinerary. That’s because we wanted to make it to Dodge City on Day 1 without having to drive a full 10 hours in a single day. And we had a relative in Ft. Worth that we could stay with that night.
The path to and from Mount Rushmore were different, on purpose. The path up goes through Oklahoma, Kansas, Nebraska and South Dakota while the path back goes through Wyoming, Colorado and back to Texas. Kelly referred to the trip as “8 states in 8 days”.
Click on the map below to see a close-up view of the route.
We used Outdoorsy.com to rent a Coachman Prism Sprinter 24G (see photo below), which was perfect for just two travelers. It has a queen-size bed in the back, a sofa, small kitchen and bathroom. There are some Class C RV’s in the 25 foot range that have an additional sleeping area above the driver’s cab area and/or an option to convert the sofa/dining table into a small bed, which means 4-5 travelers are possible.
One thing we quickly learned about RV’s is they’re noisy when driving and the air conditioning is noisy when running (ie – when parked at a campground). We got used to it.
I documented the exact itinerary we followed, including notes and ratings we captured afterwards for the benefit of others. The drive times I captured represent the approximate drive time, not including stops for gas, meals, dog walking and the like.
The downloadable document you see below includes our exact day-by-day itinerary, including the RV campgrounds we stayed at and the activities we did. It also includes a list of informative tidbits and a packing list, based on our experience as first-time neophyte RV campers.
I hope you find this information helpful to your own journey.
Gordon Daugherty 